Saturday, December 10, 2016

Engineering traffic congestion in New York---and San Francisco

City officials have intentionally ground Midtown to a halt with the hidden purpose of making drivers so miserable that they leave their cars at home and turn to mass transit or bicycles, high-level sources told The Post.

Today’s gridlock is the result of an effort by the Bloomberg and de Blasio administrations over more than a decade of redesigning streets and ramping up police efforts, the sources said.

“The traffic is being engineered,” a former top NYPD official told The Post, explaining a long-term plan that began under Mayor Mike Bloomberg and hasn’t slowed with Mayor de Blasio.

“The city streets are being engineered to create traffic congestion, to slow traffic down, to favor bikers and pedestrians,” the former official said.

“There’s a reduction in capacity through the introduction of bike lanes and streets and lanes being closed down”...

Rob's comment:

This has been San Francisco's policy for years. City Hall's big anti-car move was rushing the Bicycle Plan through the process without any environmental review, a clear violation of state law. We went to court to oppose this violation of the most important environmental law in California. Alas, that only slowed down City Hall's anti-car policies, which were affirmed by then-Mayor Newsom.

Even City Hall couldn't go for the SFCTA's Congestion Pricing plan, but it will be dusted off after the Treasure Island development puts 19,000 residents on that island.